Girls with a higher birth weight are at an increased cardiometabolic risk when they're teenagers, Australian researchers found.

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An analysis of an Australian longitudinal cohort from birth found that girls at the highest cardiometabolic risk at age 17 had a higher birth weight, ongoing BMI during childhood, and increased skinfold thickness at one year than girls with lower cardiometabolic risk.

Note that the same did not hold true for boys although increased weight at age 3 did track to increased cardiometabolic risk at age 17.

Girls with a higher birth weight are at an increased cardiometabolic risk when they're teenagers, Australian researchers found.

In a birth cohort study, girls who had high cardiometabolic risk at age 17 were 82% more likely to have been born with a higher birth weight than those at low cardiometabolic risk, Rae-Chi Huang, MD, of the University of Western Australia in Perth, and colleagues, reported in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism.

There was no association, however, between high birth weight and cardiometabolic risk in teenage boys, they reported.

"Female babies are more vulnerable than males to higher birth weight, eventuating in greater metabolic risk," Huang and colleagues wrote.

It's been shown that birth weight and childhood adiposity are associated with subsequent cardiovascular risk, and some studies have suggested that there may be gender differences within these parameters.

So Huang and colleagues looked at data on 1,053 children from the Western Australian Pregnancy (Raine) Cohort who were age 17 at the time of last follow-up.

They assessed cardiometabolic risk, measured by blood pressure, adiposity, waist circumference, insulin resistance, and lipids, as well as elevated inflammatory markers and an adverse adipokine profile.

Overall, 16% of males and 19% of females were classified as high-risk. Compared with the low-risk group, this cluster had greater waist circumference, triglycerides, insulin, systolic blood pressure, and lower high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol levels (P<0.0001 for all).

They also had significantly higher levels of C-reactive protein and uric acid (P<0.01 and P<0.001, respectively) and leptin and adiponectin (P<0.001 for both).

Girls in the high-risk category had a higher birth weight, as well as a higher body mass index (BMI) at each subsequent time point compared with girls in the low-risk category (P≤0.001).

They also had consistently higher skinfold thickness at one year and each time point thereafter, the researchers reported.

In regression analyses, high-risk girls were far more likely than low-risk ones to have been born heavy (OR 1.82, 95% CI 1.05 to 3.16, P=0.034).

In contrast, there was no difference in birth weight between high- and low-risk males, although differences in weight and BMI began to emerge at age 3, they reported. In regression analyses, those in the high-risk group appeared to be less likely to have been born heavier, but the finding wasn't significant.

Huang and colleagues said the results are important given that in utero exposure "may be of greater relevance than genetic susceptibility on the development of metabolic disorders" for women.

They said the findings are especially concerning given that at a population level, the rate of high birth weight is increasing and may have deleterious effects on cardiometabolic risk in women.

They suggested a need for public health messages that target both maternal health and measures in early infancy as a means of preventing childhood obesity and its consequences.

The study was limited by attrition during the 17-year follow-up, although the final sample still accurately reflects the general Australian population, according to the authors.

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